


Come Back To Me

by leiaryes



Series: Anywhere, Everywhere (All I Want Is You) [1]
Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Angst, Canon Compliant, Goodbyes, Keith/Lance (Voltron) Angst, M/M, Mutual Pining, klance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-15
Updated: 2017-10-15
Packaged: 2019-01-17 22:00:18
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,312
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12374982
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/leiaryes/pseuds/leiaryes
Summary: Somewhere behind him, his family watched him go.Yet no one followed.No one came running.And he was left alone in the quiet hum of the silence around him.





	Come Back To Me

**Author's Note:**

> Just a little klance scene I decided to write after seeing the first episode of season four. I hope you guys enjoy it!

His footsteps were dull _clicks_ in the hallway, their sounds sharp and pronounced as they bounced off the cold walls surrounding him. This part of the castleship was dark— _abandoned_. What little light there was came from the thinly illuminated blue strips lining the floor, and everything his eyes took in was merely a shadow of its actuality, a ghost of what once was. The surfaces around him were bare; the floor beneath his feet gleamed with a shine of disuse; and somewhere in the distance, a generator rumbled.

Somewhere behind him, his family watched him go.

Yet no one followed.

No one came running.

And he was left alone in the quiet hum of the silence around him.

Keith tried not to think about it, tried telling himself that it was for the best. What he was doing was important, needed. Joining the Blade was what he wanted, it was what he had spent countless hours over the last few months contemplating. This was his chance to finally understand himself, his family, his history. So why was he feeling so empty?

His feet turned down another hallway, his body carrying him towards the pod bay. Around him, the castle remained silent, and Keith found his mind straying, without permission, to the group he had left behind him. Flashes of their faces raced past his vision. Their anger, when he had come back from his mission; their support, when he had announced his leaving. He should have been happy—relieved, even. They were allowing him to go, he was no longer weighed down by the burden of having to be their leader. Shiro could take his place once again, and Keith would be able to stop his sorry act of attempting to command like the former.

So why, then, did every step pound at his chest with the force of a thousand stars?

He came to a stop in the space between one hallway and another. Keith breathed in, shaky and uncertain. He closed his eyes, ran a hand through his hair, and then he turned. Instead of heading to his pod, Keith deviated right, walking down a path he had taken countless other times. He smiled at the familiar glow, at the doors lining either sides of the hall, inviting him in.

Keith walked until he reached his destination. The door in front of him opened without difficulty and he stepped in, taking in the simple arrangement before him. His room was sparse, lacking in any real decoration or personality. It didn’t bother him; Keith always preferred the training room, anyway. But he had come here with a purpose, and so he crossed the small distance to his bed and reached beneath the pillow, fingers finding the corners of his only other belonging save for his knives and clothing.

He pulled out the photograph, staring at the image in his hands. Pidge had given one to each of them, right before they had faced Zarkon all those months ago. It was a group picture, one they had taken outside the castleship with fatigue lining their faces and hope brightening their eyes. He saw Coran who, despite managing to look elsewhere, smiled with an enthusiasm palpable even through the two-dimensional image. He saw Allura, standing prim and proper, ever the princess and diplomat, her grin radiant. Next his eyes found Pidge and Hunk. The latter had the younger paladin raised atop his shoulders, and the two were caught in mid-laughter, sharing a joke to which the punchline had been lost through the lens of the camera. Keith came across Shiro next, who stood behind the rest of them and looked on, an endless pride for his team, his unit, his family. Though war and violence had tired the older male to look years beyond his age, the picture in his hands reminded Keith of a Shiro before any of it, of a Shiro dreaming about space and exploration and the mysterious unknown. It made the corners of his eyes crinkle, and he blinked furiously to keep the wetness from spilling out.

Wanting to move on, Keith trailed his eyes to Lance, and just as soon felt his pulse quicken. In the picture, the blue paladin stood beside him, an arm resting on his shoulder as he leaned in to smirk at him. Keith saw the amusement in his eyes, heard the playful banter in his voice, all but felt his weight on him. He remembered what Lance had said that day. It had been a silly goad from the latter to make him smile, a lighthearted challenge to set Keith at ease. He remembered the way it had felt, having Lance against him. His entire body had locked up slightly, before relaxing and giving in to the position himself.

He had liked that day. He had liked it a lot.

Keith found his own self in the image, and not for the first time blushed upon seeing the similar red dusting his cheeks in the picture. It wasn’t the first time he’d gotten like this. For the past few months, any mention of Lance was enough to send his pulse racing and face heating. He didn’t really know when it had started, only knew that one day he had woken up, and lance had been a little less annoying and a lot more entrancing. And in the space between Shiro’s disappearance and now, Lance had become something more. He had become his rock, guiding him and providing support. He had become his friend, Keith liked to think, even if he wished for a little more than that.

He studied the picture again, seeing the smiles of his teammates. He saw the way their heads turned up, some unseen hope for the future carrying them onwards. He saw the way their arms linked, their faces shined, a link brought about by camaraderie and trust. He felt the unity between them, and wished with a sudden vigour to go back, to travel to the moment the picture was taken and live in it forever. He wanted this. He wanted this so, _so_ bad. So why was he giving it up?

“I thought you would have left by now.”

The door to his room opened suddenly, and Keith scrambled to fit the photograph into a hidden pocket of his suit. His hand reached to his hood almost instinctively, the fabric coming over his head to shield him. Hide him.

Because he recognized that voice. Because he’d recognize it anywhere.

Because that knowledge terrified him.

And he didn’t know how to face it.

The room fell silent, intermitted only by the sounds of the shallow breathing of the two occupants inside. Keith was fully aware of his visitor, as he always was, and he let out a pained whimper as the boy behind him spoke.

“Keith?” The voice was gentle, melodic. It was soothing in every way imaginable, and he wished he could fall asleep listening to it.

He slowly turned, eyes closed, preparing. He cursed himself. He should have left; he should not have come here. He should have gone straight to the pods and not looked back, joined the Blades and left it at that.

But the universe was too cruel for that. _He_ was too weak for that.

And now he had to face _him._

“Hey.” Lance’s voice was soft, patient. When Keith opened his eyes he saw the tan boy looking back at him, a mixture of concern, sadness, and something else swimming in his bright blue irids. He wanted to commit the image to his memory, to forever see the ocean that filled the other boy’s eyes.

But doing so would get him nowhere. So Keith let himself look away.

He didn’t utter a word.

The door closed behind him as Lance stepped into the room, the silence growing tenfold now that the hum from the hallway had been left behind. Keith felt the blue paladin’s presence drawing nearer, and he wanted to run. He willed his feet to move, but they stayed rooted.

He was stuck.

It felt like minutes; it felt like seconds, but then suddenly Keith was staring down at a pair of blue boots as Lance came to stand across him. The former stood still, breath held and body frozen as the latter reached up, pulling down the hood that veiled his face from him. The cloth came away easily as it fell to rest atop his shoulders. With no barrier between them, Keith looked up.

Lance smiled, small and sad. “You don’t need that,” he whispered. Keith thought he almost heard the timbre of his voice crack. He didn’t know what to do, what to say, so he did what he always did: he remained silent.

Lance searched his eyes, questioning. “Why are you really leaving?”

“The Blade needs me.” The answer came almost immediately, as rehearsed as it was in his mind. He didn’t think twice about his reply. The mantra had become so constant that Keith needed no time to doubt.

Lance was frowning. “So do we,” he murmured, and Keith thought there was a pleading edge to his voice. The words made something clench in his chest.

_Stop._

His mouth opened without hesitation. “No,” he replied, “you don’t. You have Shiro; I’m not your leader anymore.”

“But you’re our friend.” This time, the tremor in Lance’s voice was clear, and Keith’s heart twisted painfully.

 _Please,_ he thought, _don’t make this any harder._

“Does that not mean anything?” Lance continued.

_Stop it._

“Don’t you care?”

_Of course I do. I care so God damned much._

And there it was. The realization hit him with the force of a thousand stars exploding, of a galaxy destroying itself a hundred times over. It left him gasping for breath in a room constructed from air, left him shutting his eyes in a place already surrounded by darkness.

_I care too much._

And that thought left him petrified. It left him on his hands and knees, heart constricting and mind feeling numb.

“Why are you leaving, Keith?” Lance asked again, voice more muted this time, exhaustion distinct in the way his words left his tongue.

_Because I care._

_Because I’m scared._

_Because I’m going to mess up._

_Because you’re going to realize I’m a monster._

He didn’t know how to word any of that. He didn’t know how to explain his feelings, his thoughts. He didn’t know how to show that his mind was a fucked up place, that he was terrified of it. He didn’t know how to ask for help, so he looked away and turned in on himself.

“I don’t know,” came his answer, and Keith bit at his lip to keep the water in his eyes from spilling. He wanted to run and hide. He wanted to stay and plead for help. He wanted so desperately for an out, and he wanted so desperately to keep this group of people he had found together. His jaw trembled.

And suddenly there were arms around him. Strong, secure arms, holding him to a warm chest and beating heart. Lance’s presence encircled him, drowned him, provided a warmth and comfort he didn’t know he so desperately needed. The other boy clung the once-red paladin to him, an embrace filled with sorrow, sympathy, and support. Keith found solace in it, found a peace he hadn’t felt in a long, long time. He allowed his eyes to close, allowed himself to breathe in Lance in all his being. He let himself imagine of another world, one where the boy holding him might have been his reality.

A tear escaped. And then another.

Keith wanted this. He wanted this so, _so_ badly. He wanted this unlike anything else, needed it like nothing he had ever needed before. He wanted to see this—Lance—every morning. He needed to wake up to this face and these arms and this dumb, stupid mouth. He wanted to run his hands through the soft, brown strands he’d gazed at so many times before, needed to stare into the wide, curious, navy blue irids that held the stars and the sea and everything in between within them.  

He wanted the team. He wanted the family he had found in four humans, two aliens, and four mice aboard a castle in space.

He wanted it all. He needed it all.

And that was why he untangled himself from the arms holding him.

That was why he moved away.

 _I’ll hurt you,_ he thought.

_I’ll hurt you all._

_And you’ll hurt me._

That was why he turned from the other paladin.

And that was why he stepped towards the door.

“Keith.”

He froze. He could hear the pain in Lance’s voice, knew the boy had tears streaming down the sides of his face. He didn’t look, _couldn’t_ look. So he waited.

An unsteady breath. A choke of air.

“I won’t try to stop you,” Lance whispered. “But please, come back to us.”

It wasn’t an outburst. It wasn’t an order. It was a plea, and it sounded exhausted.

Keith stepped through the doorway, allowing the metal to slide shut behind him. He left Lance, left the boy’s words hanging in empty air. He turned his back on the room and walked, never once looking back.

_Come back to us._

His heart lurched.

_Come back to us._

Tears fell from his burning eyes.

_Come back to us._

 

_I can’t promise you that._

 

* * *

In the dim light of the bedroom, Lance crumbled. His knees hit the cold, harsh floor as he fell, tears staining the pristine tile as they came down in waves and rolled off his cheeks. Hands found his hair, pulling, and muffled cries escaped, unwanted.

A jaw trembled. A voice broke. A scream tore out.

 _Come back to us,_ he thought.

_Please._

_Come back to me._

**Author's Note:**

> Tumblr: [here](https://leiaryes.tumblr.com)


End file.
